


Blue Pajamas

by lookupkate



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Eventual relationship, Ghost!Sherlock, Hauntings, John and Sherlock as children, John and Sherlock growing up together, John and Sherlock in love, M/M, Major characters die but don't leave the story, Mike Stamford as matchmaker, Sherlock Being Sherlock, Slow Burn, aka cannon, friendship to romance, major character deaths aren't as bad as you think, sherlock is sort of a poltergeist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-08
Updated: 2015-11-20
Packaged: 2018-04-30 13:26:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 17,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5165462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lookupkate/pseuds/lookupkate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It never occurred to John's parents that the boy their son talked about was more than a school friend. It never occurred to John's teachers that the boy was anything more than a family friend or neighbor. It never occurred to John that Sherlock was anything but a boy. That's how John ended up, at the age of ten, with what was for all deeds and purposes an imaginary friend.</p><p>Sherlock wasn't really imaginary, of course, as he himself would attest to John's lack of imagination, but rather a boy who used to BE that simply WASN'T anymore. He was a ghost.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Goodbye, Hello

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yarnjunkie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yarnjunkie/gifts), [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts), [Tardisqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tardisqueen/gifts), [DaringD](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaringD/gifts), [Batik](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Batik/gifts), [MyriadProBold](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MyriadProBold/gifts), [JunkenMetel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JunkenMetel/gifts), [Doctor_Tinycat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Doctor_Tinycat/gifts), [JuJuBee (Marcy09)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marcy09/gifts), [mamf](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=mamf), [vixis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/vixis/gifts).



> The writer's block fairy took me hostage for quite a long time there. I'm hoping this will get me back on track. Each chapter will be three years of their life together, starting with age seven. Any questions can be left in the comments. Missed you guys.

Being a ghost had depressed Sherlock's mother. She had no friends left for garden parties and no house to tend to. It nearly broke her when the local grocery bought up the land where they used to live, brushing aside all the detritus left behind from the house fire and flattening the land to make a garden store. She cried for hours as she watched new seeds being planted, literally as well as figuratively. It was the sign that the life they had was not only over but forgot.

Sherlock reacted differently, for a time at least, unshackled from the chains of school and social niceties. He flourished as he was given the chance to direct his own learning, the chance to plan his own days. He was seven, after all, and no longer a child. He saw himself as the owner of his fate and a grand explorer of all things dangerous and disgusting. 

No harm, after all, could come to a ghost. No broken bone or danger of drowning. The world was full of unlimited excitement and his experiments grew from observation to intervention. While he used to spend hours watching frogs from the shore he now crawled deep into the weeds, muck, and water; not a movement disturbing his subjects, not a splash. 

When he started to learn to hold things like sticks and leaves, at the age of nine, he frightened quite a few ecosystems with his meddling, something his brother chided him over, and his parents by bringing them bits of animal bones and shed snake skin to them.

He learned how long foxes were pregnant before giving birth and the color and makeup of the fluids that came along with the birthing process. He learned how to stick his head halfway through things to feel inside them. He once spent the whole of an afternoon resting with his head in a deer's abdomen, the sound of the heartbeat and heat of digestion lulling him to sleep. 

He was a true naturalist, observing nature every second he could and never tiring of the way its pieces moved as one. The landscape breathed and he listened.

He couldn't really be blamed for ignoring the fact that his parents were falling into a deeper and deeper depression. It took him no time at all to adjust to life without the trappings of humanhood. He didn't long too badly for sleep and food didn't interest him at all, didn't worry over not having a house. The world, the natural world, was his home. It had always been more of a home to him than anything brick and mortar. 

When Mycroft told him, about a year after they'd died, that his parents had to go away he cried. He cried for days but he kept on learning, kept on discovering. It was all he could do. He asked once where they had gone but the answer, that Mycroft didn't know, hurt more than the question.

He felt alone without them, even though he spent most his time away from them. He was alone. That is, until the blond boy started coming to the woods.

_____

Soon enough he'd mastered all the ins and outs of ghosting and could move through his surroundings with ease. When he was nine, two years after the fire that landed him and his family in this queer predicament, his older brother taught him to pick up heavier earthly objects. Picking them up was easy, it was controlling two objects at once that was hard.

"You've got to focus," Mycroft said as he tossed another ball in Sherlock's direction, watching as it passed through the cricket bat and rolled to the base of a nearby tree, not a second thought given to he boy swinging said bat.

"I AM focusing!" Sherlock shouted.

Just as he did he heard the boy come down the path and waved Mycroft away. Mycroft rolled his eyes and turned into that fancy mist he'd refused to teach Sherlock about. The boy drew closer and sat in the grass with a stick, lazily drawing lines in the mud. He looked lonely. He often did.

Sherlock sat next to him with a sigh. "I don't see why you have to draw simple lines when you could draw a multitude of more interesting patterns. Even I was able to draw fairly good circles before the accident."

John sighed and lay back in the grass.

"It really is quite rude to ignore someone when they're talking to you," Sherlock pressed, "and someday you'll be able to hear me and you'll feel quite foolish to have made me wait so long for your company."

_____

It took Sherlock another year to be able to appear in front of John, a year he spent materializing only in John's dreams but doing a rather good job of that, at least.

John had met Sherlock the first time in a dream about the local faire. Sherlock had taken to walking with John for hours, playing in the muck beside him and splashing through the streams that wound their way behind the boy's house. And, of course, often following him home.

Mycroft seemed a bit worried over that last behavior, sure that Sherlock must be depressed as he himself never felt the itch to interact with humans. "They aren't like us," he'd tried to explain. "I don't care about the rest of them," Sherlock had replied with a sniff.

So there John was, nestled below the sheets, and there Sherlock was, beside him as ever. The real boy breathed deeply and his nose twitched just like Sherlock's dog had years before in its sleep. Sherlock closed his eyes and lay his head against John's and slipped into his dream. 

Funny thing, that, slipping into dreams. Like walking onto the set of a movie where the actors don't know they're actors.

John had candy floss and a ridiculous hat and was sitting on a pile of hay below a Ferris wheel, eyes fixed on a point high above him and unmoving. Though his eyes didn't move his left hand did, the candy floss moving closer to Sherlock and then waving in front of him.

"You don't like candy floss, then?" John asked when Sherlock remained still.

Sherlock took a bit, hesitantly, and stuck it into his mouth. The sweetness was overwhelming. Candy floss is sweet enough when you haven't spent the past few years forgetting what sweet was.

"It's good," Sherlock replied softly.

"Mum bought it for me," John replied. "She's at the top of the Ferris wheel."

Sherlock looked to where John had gestured, the top booth seeming to get farther away as he did so. "Won't she come down?" He asked.

"Don't know," John replied sullenly, "but I wish she would."

Sherlock took another bit of floss and settled in, intent to wait with the boy who had actually seen him until his mother came down.

"Where's your mother?" John asked.

"I don't know," Sherlock replied with a frail sort of honesty.

_____

It was the third of March when John saw Sherlock in his waking life for the first time. It gave him a fright that quickly turned into a bout of giggles.

"What's so funny?" Sherlock demanded.

"You're wearing pajamas in the middle of the day," John replied.

The fact that John had heard him struck Sherlock as possibly the only sign that there was a god out there, contrary to his current situation. He looked down at himself and was disappointed to find the pajamas he wearing when he died were still there, shifting from blue trimmed with rocket ships to simply blue trimmed as he had aged. He hadn't been seen by anyone outside his brother in so long that he'd almost forgot that his clothes mattered. He shook himself and stood a bit taller.

"What's wrong with pajamas?" He asked angrily.

"Not the best route when trying to make a friend," his brother whispered from beside him, unseen.

Sherlock ignored him and raised an eyebrow at the boy.

"Well, nothing, I suppose. My mum just wouldn't let me go outside like that. Does the mud feel good between your toes?" John asked.

Sherlock scrunched up his nose and wiggled his toes and decided, yes, it felt quite good.

"Why don't you take your shoes off and see?" He asked.

John smiled and started unlacing his shoes. "I'm John, by the way. You look familiar."

"I'm Sherlock," the taller boy replied.

"What are you doing in the woods?" John asked as he slipped from his shoes and socks and stood carefully.

"Same as you, I suppose," Sherlock lied, knowing John came to that precise place each day after school to escape his parents.

"This is gross," John said, looking at his feet as the cool mud pushed its way between his toes.

Sherlock smiled and John glanced up and smiled as well.

"Would you like to be my friend?" John asked.

"Obviously," Sherlock replied.

John's smile turned into a grin. "I'm ten," he added.

"Me too," Sherlock replied. "Do you like frogs?"


	2. I Ran Right Through Him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ages eleven through their thirteenth birthday.

On John's eleventh birthday he invited Sherlock to his party.

"Some kids from school are coming. Harry says I have to have friends over so she can have her friends over. I invited the football team. It's going to be boring...unless..." John started nervously.

Sherlock dropped the notebook he'd been drawing in and looked up. Well, I suppose dropped isn't exactly the word for it. It fell. It fell through his hands at the shock of what he knew John was going to say.

"Unless you'll come," John finished quickly.

"I'll have to ask my mum," Sherlock said hoarsely after blinking at John for a few seconds longer than he'd meant to.

It was a lie, of course. It had been years since his mother disappeared, fading away as she grew tired of her new existence. However much he wanted to go there was no way he could control a group of children, let alone the whole of the football team and John's obnoxious older sister.

Controlling people wasn't really like controlling objects. Although Sherlock had managed to learn how to move objects through the air he still hit that small little snag of human will. Books, bags, even frogs didn't seem to have anything approaching the stubbornness of human will. He had tried many times, the most recent being his trip to the toy store to get John a present. He ended up having to push the present along the floor and out the door, dismayed by his failure to compete the simple taste of getting the clerk to turn around. She hadn't wanted to. That was the issue. Humans simply didn't want to be controlled.

Sherlock had thought it was a bit different with John at first. Thought himself brilliant for making John see him. It only occurred to him later, after many a failure, that John had WANTED to see him. John had wanted to see Sherlock so badly that the rules seemed to bend, sway, due to his will. 

John was powerful after all, more powerful than he was ready to see. His bravery was often what stood between bullies and their intended victims at school. He'd even knocked the tooth out of a much larger boy who'd said awful things to him about his sister, things he didn't yet understand.

"Alright," John replied sadly, knowing Sherlock was never allowed to go to his house.

"I've been thinking," Sherlock said, eager to change the subject, "that we should build a treehouse. I've always wanted one and it's going to start raining soon."

John's face lit up and he clapped his hands together. "Yes! Brilliant! When can we start?"

Sherlock relaxed and chewed his bottom lip. "Next week? My brother can get us the wood and nails if we can borrow your dad's tools."

"Deal!" John beamed.

_____

It took nearly three months for them to finish the treehouse, John's father helping John at the last minute to hoist the nearly made thing onto a low branch as Sherlock stood a bit away, unseen by either of them. Sherlock had pretended to be surprised when they met later that day and he'd never seen John be more proud of his father.

That hurt Sherlock. He'd seen the bruises the man had left on John, the marks from too much rough handling. John was brave, but his father was cruel. He was nothing at all like John, and for that Sherlock was happy.

They sat under the handmade roof and John lit a small candle and set it in the corner. It was a blustery day and they both knew John wouldn't be able to stay out much longer. The sun left the sky early that time of year.

"What do you want to do next week?" John asked, taking up the toy T-Rex skeleton Sherlock had got him for his birthday and focusing on fitting a new rib in with the small plastic tweezers from the kit. "It's almost time for mum to buy me new rain boots so she doesn't really care if the old ones get scuffed up. I was thinking we could do an experiment on them."

Sherlock nodded emphatically and leaned forward. "We could burn them," he suggested.

"I've heard that's no good for your lungs," John objected.

Sherlock rolled his eyes and leaned back against the slightly slanted wall. "You worry too much."

John sighed and picked up a new rib. "Do you reckon they have one of these in human as well as dinosaur?"

"I'll see," Sherlock replied, watching John's small hands work.

_____

Over the next year Sherlock nicked three more skeleton kits for John, including a human, and didn't feel too bad about it as he'd foiled a plot to rob the place by walking through the would be robber on his last not-purchase and making the man's legs go all funny. He felt the cold bluntness of the knife drop from the man's pocket as he moved through him. The man, superstitious (just look at his shoes), had seen it as a sign and turned quickly and walked away.

It was a powerful feeling, affecting a human, a much more powerful feeling than any small boy should wield. Sherlock felt giddy all day and when he gave John the last of the kits, a dog, the truth spilled out of him.

"I stopped a man from robbing the toy shop today!" He yelped.

John's eyes went wide.

"I ran right through him and he dropped his knife and ran away!" He added.

John had a vision of Sherlock running into a slight man with enough force to knock him over and grinned. "You should be a copper! You could catch criminals all day!"

Sherlock rolled his eyes playfully and pushed John's shoulder. "I'm much too smart to be a policeman. That lot would bore me to death."

John giggled and rubbed his shoulder and Sherlock realised for the first time that he could TOUCH John. It was a thought that stayed with him all through the night.

_____

Two days after John's thirteenth birthday he came into the woods crying. John never cried. He was brave and strong and never ever cried. The fact that tears were falling from his eyes as he stared ahead with a look of certainty made Sherlock very uncomfortable.

"What happened?" Sherlock asked as John climbed the rope ladder up to the treehouse without him.

"Harry's gone," he grumbled, sitting with his back to the doorway and his fists clenched at his sides.

"What do you mean she's gone?" Sherlock asked, dumbfounded.

"Dad says she can't see her girlfriend anymore and she stole his whiskey and ran away," John grunted, "and I hate him!"

With that a sob wracked his body and Sherlock went to his side.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, meaning it more than any other sentence he'd ever uttered.

John sobbed again and Sherlock wrapped his arm around him, pulling him sideways until John's head rested on his shoulder. He slumped so their height different didn't matter and John reached over with the hand not covering his eyes and twined their fingers together.

"Sh-Sherlock," he choked, "I think...I think I might be gay."

And with that he was well and truly gone, body shaking uncontrollably as he slid to the floor, his warm hand gripping Sherlock's tighter. Sherlock cooed to John as his mother used to do to him and rubbed his back and for the first time ever thought about his own sexuality. And what frightening thoughts.

_____

It really wasn't something Sherlock had ever considered, but after that day he thought about his sexuality often. Strange thing to realise, that ghosts go through puberty. He'd noticed the changes, of course, but with no one to talk to other than John and his distant brother, and no sexual education class to attend, he'd simply thought of his bodily rousings as a strange, if persistent itch. One he scratched and forgot.

In the week following John's revelation, one he quickly retracted after pulling himself together by stating my his unwavering (if slightly uncharacteristic) carnal lust after one Jennifer James who'd grown breasts over the summer, Sherlock spent a rather embarrassing amount of time at the library looking through art books and getting excited over male nudes. The female ones did utterly nothing for him so he figured he must be gay. Gay and dead. Not a good combination.

His thirteenth year would be a rough one, and for that matter, so would John's.


	3. Gay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What it says on the tin.

John had started noticing the pert behinds of other players on his football team. Noticing them wasn't something new entirely but his body's reaction was. There was something he had been trying to understand for the past few years that just slotted into place. 

He was gay.

Well, not gay exactly, because he did think his girlfriend was pretty and kissing her did make him want to rut wildly against something but then he'd see James, skin red from the showers, and his brain would go 'oh, hello' and he would need a towel to cover his interest. He knew that straight people didn't feel like that so he must be...some sort of gay.

He went home the day of his thirteenth birthday to ask Harry, the only wealth of gay knowledge he knew he could get his hands on, but was dismayed to find her gone. Gone for good, his mother had said. Harry had run away before, packed one day's clothing and stolen a few pounds from mum's wallet and ran, but this was different. All her pictures were gone, the only thing left was the gummy residue in their place on the mirror in her bedroom. Her clothes were gone, too.

Mummy cried on and off for days, drifting into Harry's room and then leaving again with a great sob. Father hadn't been any better. He didn't cry, just spent every chance he got explaining to anyone he could manage that Harry had always been falling in with trouble makers. John had to hear most of it, from both sides, and he knew then that he would never date a boy.

That's why her and father had been fighting, after all, that was why they always fought. They fought for Harry's eternal soul. It's bad enough when someone hates your sister because they know she's gay, that can be stifled with an elbow to the ribs, but when they hate the 'gayness' in her she's put in the position of hiding or...fleeing. Harry would never hide. John would do exactly that.

_____

"You don't mind being a ghost and not having friends?" Sherlock asked, sitting across from Mycroft at the library.

"Not in the least," Mycroft replied. "Friends are for those who don't really want to change policy. I have more important things to do than focus on getting along with other ghosts or getting to know people."

The last word was spit with disdain.

"Plus, they might not like you because you're gay," Sherlock added, eyeing his brother carefully for a reaction.

Mycroft sputtered and set his book down with a thump that caused the librarian to walk over and look meekishly around the corner at the table they were sat. She didn't see them, of course, and put it to old pipes or whatever other nonsense humans used to explain away ghosts.

"Why on earth would you-" Mycroft started before reeling himself back in. "Gay people have friends, Sherlock. Gay ghosts too, I suppose. Being gay doesn't mean you have to be alone."

Sherlock cocked his head to the side shortly before standing and leaving the building through the closest wall. 

As far as he was concerned Mycroft could spend the whole day setting up elaborate ways to get the 'right people' to see the 'right information' at the 'right time', public policy was still boring. Even more so when you can't even talk to the parties involved. Sherlock would take John's friendship over policy any day. 

Mycroft watched him leave with an unusually genuine sigh and wondered how on earth he was supposed to explain sex to his brother, let alone the fact that the one person he'd want to have anything to do with could most definitely not participate in the activity. He frowned and picked his book back up.


	4. Relief

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stuck on age thirteen...it is an awfully exciting age.

Thirteen saw no more of Harry, the winter months dragging on and spring being too cold for someone to be living on the street. John was sure that was where she was. He was unnerved by the idea, no matter how much they had fought. She shouldn't be on the street at fifteen, cold and alone and fending for herself like some animal. It was June before he heard from her; a lone phone call that he had picked up before his mother. He was thankful for that.

Sherlock saw how much it was affecting John but had no clue how to go about helping his friend. He kept him busy instead, catching fireflies and making tents out of bedsheets. John's mother finally let him sleep in the woods on a late August night, the day being seasonably warm and dusk holding it well. 

He surprised John with a tent, a real one, he'd nicked from a department store that was so far away that he had to take two trains and had accidentally walked into four people. The most difficult part of the trip was moving the tent along the ground while no one was looking. It had taken two hours to get there and an exhausting five to get back. It was worth the ordeal when he saw John's face light up as he drew near, torch and sleeping bag in hand.

"Brilliant!" John exclaimed, trotting along to get a better look at the inside of the orange monstrosity.

"My brother says we can borrow it as long as we keep it clean," Sherlock lied.

John unzipped the front and climbed in, rolling out his sleeping bag and setting aside his torch and the small radio he always carried in his pocket. 

"I thought you were crazy when you told me not to bring the sheets and laundry pins. This is just perfect. Just perfect," John added as he lay on his back with his hands under his head.

"Going to sleep already?" Sherlock teased, following him in and settling down next to him on the sleeping bag he borrowed (stole) from a neighbors house.

John elbowed him in the side and laughed, a sound Sherlock thought he'd heard the end of. He smiled a rare crooked smile and John looked him right in the eye, breath faltering, before looking away. It was an awkward moment in which his stomach had fluttered and his face grew hot. Laying on the ground with John, in a tent or not, had been more difficult as of late, his hand always gravitating closer. 

"Let's go for a walk first," John said, stretching and climbing back out of the tent, torch in hand.

"Where to?" Sherlock asked, already following after.

"Let's follow the river," John replied.

"How far?" Sherlock asked.

"As far as it goes," John said with a mischievous smile.

Sherlock chuckled and followed after.

_____

It was past twelve when they made it back to the tent. They were both exhausted, but in the way that just makes you feel more alive.

"Do you reckon we should go to bed?" John asked, setting aside the jar Sherlock had brought, the one they'd filled with three bugs and a few leaves.

"No," Sherlock replied, yawning a bit, "I'm not even tired."

"You're a terrible liar, Sherlock Holmes," John said with a sleepy grin.

Sherlock shrugged and looked into the jar as John began undressing. It was something he couldn't look away from for long, John's tanned skin being shown bit by bit. When he was finally in his pants and t-shirt John slipped into his sleeping bag and rolled onto his side.

"I suppose you're already dressed for bed," John teased. "Why don't you ever wear shoes?"

Sherlock swallowed and slipped into his own sleeping bag. "Like to feel the earth, is all," he said weakly.

"Come on," John said with a bit of concern, "you know I'd never poke fun at you. I was just asking."

Sherlock rolled onto his side and rested his arm under his head with a sigh. "I know, John."

"Lights out?" John asked.

Sherlock nodded and John switched off his torch and shifted onto his stomach.

The dark made things easier to say, Sherlock found, as he swallowed roughly and whispered, "John," and then, "I'm gay. Completely."

"Oh," John replied, something twitching in his abdomen, the same something that always signaled an onslaught of arousal. 

And if they kissed, soft and full of longing, it was only the owls and the bugs in their jar that were any the wiser. And wasn't that a relief?


	5. I'm Real

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Age fourteen, fifteen and sixteen.

John broke up with his girlfriend. His excuse wasn't any good without the information that he'd fallen for someone else but he'd put so little into the relationship to begin with, spending all his time with a friend in the woods near his home, that the girl simply sighed in an exasperated fashion and walked away. John counted himself lucky for not having to explain himself too much and went on his way.

That afternoon, not long after football practice and the lads trying to get him to spill the dirt on his love life, John grinned from ear to ear as he and Sherlock lay at the edge of the creek and lit things on fire with a lighter John had nicked from his father.

"You look maniacal," Sherlock offered, glancing sideways to find that, once again, John was focusing on him rather than the experiment.

"I look what?" John asked, licking his lips and rolling onto his side.

"Like a maniac," Sherlock replied. 

"Aren't I allowed to just be happy?" John asked with a deep, and you guessed it, happy sigh.

Sherlock looked him in the eyes long enough for the flame to reach his fingers and then yelped in feigned pain. John giggled and took Sherlock's hand in his, brought fingertips to lips, and kissed so gently Sherlock's eyes slipped closed.

Touch was...well, touch was new. New and fantastic and entirely singular to John. 

_____

Sherlock and John's fourteenth year went by with warm tongues and rowdy laughter and the feeling that things would always, ultimately, be that simple. It was the two of them against the rest of the world and they had chosen to hide away, had chosen to shun said world and instead live for and with each other.

John continued to be interested in anatomy and Sherlock managed to help him sneak into the morgue a few times a month to look at dead bodies and make out in broom closets. He was delighted by the lack of squirming from John and managed to have a very nice library of oddities set up in their old treehouse by the end of that year.

John had, of course, complained a bit about the jar with the hand in it but as soon as he had made his feelings known he brushed said feelings aside and started to examine it.

_____

By age fifteen John was already reading at a much higher level than his fellow students and was put into a program that moved him to sixth form the next year, early.

Sherlock, having convinced John that he had the key to the library because he worked there part time, spent nights studying beside John and only feeling a bit short changed that he couldn't go to uni with John in a year and a half's time. He would have been good at uni, he thought fleetingly, because that's where the students cared about learning.

When John announced he was putting in an application at St Bart's teaching hospital Sherlock went to look over the campus. When he found that the students seemed to be just as horrid in their off times as John had described his school he took back the idea that he wished he could join John. Now he just didn't want John to go.

_____

John was accepted the next year. He would go to St Bart's in the fall at age seventeen. 

By that time Sherlock had acquiesced and was 'living' in a flat his brother had somehow managed to rent, all his things set up in a room like most boys have. It was strange having a place to go to at night, stranger still that he had started to grow his collection of objects, his belongings.

When he'd first gone to see the flat he was shocked to silence to find that his brother had managed to hold onto every single notebook he'd ever written in since age seven and a half. That was nine years worth of pictures and words scrawled across varying notepads. He'd asked why on earth they'd been kept when the real question was how, he had thrown them all away. Mycroft, he supposed, had his ways.

"I thought you might want them someday," Mycroft replied calmly, as though being curator of his brother's life was nothing outside a norm the younger of the two would not have remembered.

Sherlock went through them over the next few months, his bother often watching him from the hallway, and then tired of them. His mind wasn't one to dawdle. 

_____

John asked the question on Sherlock's seventeenth 'birthday', a day they'd spent sneaking into his and his brother's flat and laying back on Mycroft's bed. Sherlock didn't have a bed, no use, he thought, but this was his flat.

"Do you think we're boyfriends?" John asked, linking his fingers with Sherlock's and chewing his bottom lip.

It was a much less suave proposition than he'd hoped for and yet it felt right. It was just them, after all, and they were always falling head long into things the wrong way round. It wouldn't hurt to ask.

"I think so," Sherlock said.

"Would you...I mean, I'd like you to meet my team. I've been made captain again and it's awful that you've never been to a game. Maybe now...now that you live with your brother you could come," John added.

Sherlock's stomach turned but he gave a small nod. John squealed and wrapped his arms around his neck and kissed him soundly on the lips.

"You can't wear pajamas, though," John said with a laugh, hands going down to cup Sherlock's bum, "and you'd best wear shoes. Don't think they'll let you in the stadium without."

He didn't know the weight of the simple statement, didn't know that Sherlock had no way of go into the game to begin with, let alone wear a different outfit than the blue pajama pants and the soft blue t-shirt he always wore.

_____

John had headed home a mere ten minutes before Mycroft arrived. It was a good thing too, because John might not have seen Mycroft but the anger and disappointment that rolled off of him would have been felt none the less. 

John had left his baseball hat on the edge of Mycroft's bed.

"What were you thinking bringing him here, Sherlock? How many times have I told you that you need to leave that boy alone?" Mycroft seethed, right hand going to smooth out the duvet covering his bed as his breathing grew rough.

"That boy?" Sherlock shouted, going to tear the baseball cap from Mycroft's grip and passing through it completely. 

"There's no reason for me to learn a name, Sherlock. This has gone on long enough. It must end," Mycroft hissed.

"It won't! It won't end because he's not just my friend, he's my boyfriend!" Sherlock seethed, hands in his pockets clenched into fists.

Mycroft turned around slowly and Sherlock was horrified to find that it wasn't anger that lingered on his face but pity. 

"Sherlock...you're a ghost. People aren't even meant to see you. You don't get to have a boyfriend," Mycroft murmured in a way that made Sherlock feel very small and very broken.

"If they aren't meant to see me then how does John? If he's not meant to see me then how...how can he..." Sherlock started.

Mycroft dropped the hat to the bed and walked forward to catch his brother as he fell to his knees.

"I'm real," Sherlock was whispering, his eyes open and staring somewhere much further than the walls of the flat. "I'm real. I'm real. I'm real."

_____

It took nearly a month for Sherlock to get over the talk with his brother, the talk that let him know he needed to pull back from his relationship with John, needed to go back to being just friends. During that month many strange things happened. Light bulbs exploded and birds started to fall from the sky, the grass under Sherlock's feet grew brown and then nearly gray if he stood in one place long enough. The physical world around Sherlock was being affected by his malaise. 

What happened to John was worse. John came down with a hacking cough that didn't seem to give up. He had trouble sleeping and had skipped so many school days that his teachers were beginning to comment.

"If I don't get over this I won't get the credits needed to start next fall," John said through a bout of wheezes.

"You've got to leave him be, Sherlock," Mycroft whispered from behind the two boys.

Sherlock glared at him over his shoulder and John coughed into a folded napkin. The phlegm came up red. 

What Mycroft didn't tell Sherlock was that it was Sherlock's anger that was sickening John, not just his presence. When someone won't make the right decision, Mycroft figured, it was alright to make them assume the wrong thing to get them on their way.

A week later Sherlock told John he was going to study in France. They didn't hang out as much anymore, due, Sherlock said, to his newly bolstered study schedule. John got better. 

They spent the summer growing apart, John kicking and screaming against it while Sherlock slowly pulled away. By the time fall came John said one last goodbye to Sherlock in the woods before making him promise he'd be round for Christmas break. Sherlock promised and gave him a fake phone number. John left for his dorm.


	6. Ghost. Bollocks.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This one is rough from the start. Stick with me and I promise it will be worth it.

It took John two whole weeks before he bumped into Sherlock at Bart's. Well, bumped through. Sherlock had managed to fool around in the morgue undisturbed for several hours before an exhausted John came down to meet with his professor. He was early, but then again, Sherlock was really cutting things a bit close. It was surely because he wanted to see John. That was still no excuse.

So John had come into the room when Sherlock wasn't looking and walked around the slab to where Sherlock was just turning to leave. Their shoulders brushed through each other and John felt a cold dread that made him turn around. Sherlock backed himself up against the wall, sure he'd be seen.

John didn't see him, of course, the transformation Sherlock had gone through changing him in ways he hadn't expected. The heartbreak over losing John had left him hollow and if it weren't for the work he would have surely gone the way of his parents.

Just as the combination of relief and disappointment rushed over him John's professor entered. He took a seat across from John and laid a biro and a large envelope in front of him.

"You're sure?" The man asked. "It won't be easy."

Sherlock inched forward and looked over John's shoulder.

John shivered and nodded. "Easy isn't exactly my thing anyhow."

His professor nodded and opened the envelope, taking out the first three pages and handing them over.

"You'll have to sign at the recruitment office but this will let you know exactly what you're getting yourself into," the man said, and then, with no small amount of pride (something Sherlock didn't quite understand), "I expect you'll be brilliant."

John nodded again and Sherlock bit his lip and then left with a huff.

_____

He was leaving. John was leaving him for at least seven months. It was ridiculous, he'd never mentioned any interest in the army before. Sherlock would have known. And didn't it mean he'd have to start all his classes over again once he'd returned from training?

Sherlock walked down the long hallway, not caring as he pushed trough several students, leaving emotional destruction in his wake. His anger rubbed off, you see. 

_____

Sherlock sat on John's dorm bed for hours that day, fingers brushing along the rough fabric. He waited for John to get back and then attempted to materialise. 

John looked up as the curtains swayed and then went to the window to look out. His books were dashed from his desk behind him and he spun quickly to find nothing, no one, there.

Sherlock stomped in anger and cursed loudly and a crack appeared in the wall.

"John, you utter bastard, look at me! You can't do this, you idiot! It's too bloody dangerous! The army? Have you lost your f-fucking-" his words cut off as a sudden lightheadedness took over and he slipped to his knees. The world went black shortly after.

_____

"Well, what do you think it was?" Mike, John's roommate, asked as they shared tea.

"I'd say earthquake but that's mad," John said unsteadily. "You saw the crack in the wall."

"Building settling?" Mike asked.

John snorted and crossed his arms. "I don't know, mate. Seemed like a lot more than that at the time. Maybe I'm losing my marbles."

"Lack of sleep," Mike replied with a nod. 

John sighed and picked up his tea.

"So you're really leaving?" Mike asked.

"Not forever," John said, "I'll be back before you know it."

"What about Christmas break?" Mike asked.

"Afraid not," John said, suddenly remembering that he wouldn't see Sherlock and excusing himself. "I have a few calls to make."

Mike nodded and took a bite of a biscuit, picking up a textbook and opening it. John went back into his room, looked through his things for the phone number Sherlock had given him and then fished his mobile from his pocket. He entered the number and moved away from the window, thinking the coldness of the corner was due to the single pane.

Sherlock watched, resigned, from the floor, resting on his side below the window.

"Yeah?" A girl answered cheerfully.

John looked confused and cleared his throat. "Can I speak to Sherlock?" He asked.

"Who?" The girl asked from the other end of the line.

"Sherlock. Tall bloke, dark hair and...you know what, never mind," John choked before ringing off without his usual courteousness.

Sherlock let his head hit the floor and John sighed deeply.

_____

The next seven months saw Sherlock care even less about people. He made himself a room in a wing closed off for construction and spent all his time doing experiments on dead bodies he'd pilfered from the morgue.

That was when the whispers started.

"The place is haunted," a second year said to a first who was lugging a huge rucksack.

"Haunted?" The girl replied.

"Yup. The whole of the West wing is freezing and body parts disappear all the time. My friend knows someone who was possessed for a whole hour."

"Really?" The first year hissed, eyes wide.

"Yup. He tank taped a cadaver to the ceiling and didn't even remember doing it. Had to go through sensitivity training after the dean decided he didn't have respect for the deceased," the second year replied.

_____

Sherlock started a chemical fire in the West wing just weeks before John returned. Instead of trying to put it out he simply let it burn around him. His brother, at this point, had tried to get through to him, bring him out of his dark mood. Nothing had worked.

"People could have died, Sherlock," Mycroft said when he found out about the fire.

"People do little else," Sherlock replied listlessly.

"You've been having blackouts," Mycroft added.

Sherlock nearly growled at him and turned to face the wall, fingernails scratching the paint.

"You know this is what happened before mum and dad..." Mycroft started.

Sherlock's eyes grew wide and the pupils overtook the sclera and his empty black eyes stared nearly into Mycroft's soul. The windows slammed open and the glass exploded, splinters going everywhere. Mycroft had never before been afraid of his brother. Things change. People change.

_____

John did come back. He came back with a bit more muscle and shorter hair, but he came back. The day Sherlock saw him again for the first time he sobbed with relief.

He looked slimmer. Sherlock decided he needed to be fed up. He started the next day.

_____

"Thanks for the food," John said one morning after a long evening had left him unable to even think about acquiring sustenance and he'd come back to his dorm to find a plate of meatloaf and mushy peas on his desk covered in foil.

"What?" His new roommate asked.

"The meatloaf," John replied from behind his study book.

"That wasn't me," the man replied, looking at John like he was crazy.

"Oh," John said slowly. "Did you see anyone go into my room?"

"Had class all night."

John sat, dumbfounded. 

_____

It continued on like that for a whole week before John confronted the cafeteria girl, a small thing that barely spoke.

"You really don't have to keep bringing me food," John said to her over the divider.

She only peeped so he went on.

"It's sweet of you but I don't want it to cost you your job," he added, thinking it was much more creepy than sweet as he hadn't given her his room number.

"I..." She tried.

John sighed and figured she either understood or she didn't. Nothing more to say.

_____

The food didn't stop. In fact, the presents, as he saw them, grew more frequent and diverse. 

When coming home from the cafe he worked at part time weeks later John found a pair of very nice pair of black leather gloves with shearling lining on his desk. He felt he shouldn't have kept them but his own gloves were so worn at the fingertips that two fingers had pushed through and created ever growing holes.

He had the money from the army but was hesitant to spend it, the majority of it going to the college anyhow.

And they felt like heaven.

He slipped them onto his hands and let his head loll back as he sighed deeply, his face suddenly looking much younger. Sherlock swallowed roughly from where he was in the corner and felt something twitch in the vicinity of his heart. 

He stopped having blackouts the next week.

_____

The next morning John went down to confront the cafeteria girl again. Her eyes grew wide as he approached.

"You really have to stop giving me gifts," he said, abandoning preamble completely.

She choked out a whimper and shook her head. "I...it wasn't, that is, I haven't been giving you anything," she stuttered.

John, shocked, apologised a bit quickly and turned on his heel. It was crazy. He'd been sure it was her. He didn't have time for girlfriends, (and he'd not liked a boy since, well, anyhow) and he didn't think anyone had a crush on him. He took a seat and stared at his gloves.

Another student took a seat across from him and John looked up to find none other than his old roommate, Mike Stamford.

"Maybe your secret admirer is the ghost," Mike said, raising his eyebrows playfully.

John tilted his head and smiled, a bit confused. "The ghost?"

"Oh, you haven't heard?" Mike asked. "Bart's has a poltergeist. Suppose it moved in just after you left."

John chuckled nervously. "Poltergeist?" He asked with a huff. 

"Really, John," Sherlock said fondly from where he was sat, unseen, next to Mike, "with all that repetition you sound like a confused child."

"You don't really believe that," John added uncertainly.

"All the proof is there. Just ask Molly in the morgue. A whole jar of tongues from one of her experiments went missing right from under her nose last week. That and the voices people hear," Mike said. "It's the only explanation."

"You sound like a frightened first year," Sherlock said, staring at Mike. "Well, not frightened."

"It's true," said a girl at a table behind John. "The whole of my friend's biology class were poisoned three months ago. They lost a whole Wednesday."

"Poison is a rather...broad term," Sherlock huffed. "Besides, nothing important happens on Wednesdays."

John shivered and stuck his hands in his pockets.

"You should put up surveillance cameras in your room," Mike said. "Catch your friend in the act."

John brushed the whole conversation off as superstition and excused himself to go to his next class, promising Mike he'd catch up with him but not really meaning it. 

Ghost. Bollocks.


	7. Misatribution And Other Developments

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eighteen, nineteen, twenty and twenty one.

Mycroft noticed the change almost immediately. He had eyes everywhere, of course. Not that any of those eyes saw anything. It was the ears that let him know. He'd figured a way to sort of 'log in' to audio surveillance in the college system. Just wavelengths after all.

At first, after finding out that the incidents of havoc caused by his brother had dropped suddenly, he thought Sherlock had gone. It was the only explanation. Sherlock was gone and he was the last of the Holmes'. 

Thankfully, when he went to check on his brother, he was proven wrong. That wasn't as painful as he'd anticipated, being proven wrong. He hadn't had it happen in so long.

"What?" Sherlock asked with an exasperated sigh.

Mycroft pulled himself together and smoothed down his pajama trousers. "You're looking...better."

Sherlock snorted and leaned back over his experiment. "Is there something you wanted?" He asked with little heat.

"Just checking up on you," Mycroft replied smoothly. "Glad to see you're doing well."

"Is there something wrong with your spy network?" Sherlock asked.

"You're looking rather less...livid," Mycroft said, starting to sense himself outstaying his welcome.

"Get to the point," Sherlock huffed, even the huff being much less violent than expected.

"Have you spoken to him?" Mycroft asked, putting all his cards on the table.

Sherlock shivered and his mouth turned down at the corners. "No."

"Not for lack of trying, I take it," Mycroft pressed.

"I'm not coming home, if that's what you're asking," Sherlock spit.

"I wouldn't ask you to," Mycroft replied, taking a look around the room.

It was really a hall, but Sherlock had set it up as a room. He kept a desk and a long table for experiments and had nicked a small freezer from the cryo lab. He even managed to get the old sofa the teacher's lounge was throwing out into the lift and the behemoth was against one wall. 

"You've made quite a space," Mycroft said, running his fingers through the dust covering the end of the long table and thinking if Sherlock was still alive he wouldn't be for long due to the asbestos.

"I'm bored with this conversation and unless you have something to give me I would suggest-" Sherlock started.

"Don't talk to him. Don't get back into his life. It won't do either of you any good," Mycroft said with a blank face.

Sherlock stilled completely and Mycroft had a flashback to their last conversation, the one where he'd realised his brother had turned into a poltergeist. A few moments later Sherlock went back to his experiment and ignored his brother long enough for him to give up further conversation and leave.

_____

Sherlock didn't speak to John, not a word, but he didn't leave him either. It still wasn't what they had before but taking care of John gave Sherlock the impression that he wasn't useless. That did quite a lot for a person, it turned out.

When John turned eighteen he received a leather bound doctor's journal from his secret admirer and his next semester's books in a pile on his bed. When he turned nineteen he spent his birthday week away in the reserves and came back a few days later to all new sheets and pillows. He still didn't know who was doing it.

_____

Just before a really difficult exam a few days after his eighteenth birthday John felt the presence everyone had been talking about for the first time. He was confused, though, because it wasn't as he'd thought it would be. People around campus had mentioned the feeling of something passing through them and an odd feeling that they were being watched. Some had even said they had been made to do things like taking parts of cadavers out of deep freeze and leaving them to thaw. This was different.

John was sat at his seat, fairly sure he was going to have a bloody mental breakdown, when he had the odd feeling that he'd be okay. There was a warm breeze across his neck and as he closed his eyes he felt someone lay their hand on his shoulder.

He would have drawn back and looked to see who was there if not for the overwhelming feeling that everything was fine and he shouldn't move at all. He felt the hand shift to his back and he bent over the table with his arms cradling his head and breathed deeply. The hand moved up his back, neck, and then into his hair. He relaxed, all the stress gone, and waited for the test to start.

_____

The next few times he had experiences like that they involved him missing something. He'd walk out of his dorm room without his planner and feel the need to turn back. He wouldn't know why until his hand was pushed to where the planner lay. One time he'd been about to put down his razor when he felt a hand on his neck and knew, simply knew, that he'd missed a spot. 

Overall John just felt less alone. When he tried to put words to the feeling he came up with nothing. The only thing he could compare it to was how his gran used to talk about Jesus in her life. That she walked in the footsteps of something outside herself, that she was led by something greater. 

A week after his nineteenth birthday John took to wearing a cross. He wasn't converting, or anything, simply recognizing that something looked over him.

The hand he had first felt on his shoulder and the whisper of air across his neck never strayed far. He was, in a word, blessed.

_____

John sent an invitation to Mike via text for the small meetup marking his twentieth birthday. The next week when he didn't see Mike he thought the man hadn't come. It wasn't exactly true.

"I didn't know I was going to be the only one attending," Mike said, standing on the other side of the glass, watching John down his third pint in twenty minutes and wincing. 

Sherlock looked Mike up and down, taking in the dusty denims, button down, and jumper he'd been wearing when the drunk driver hit, and inevitably killed, him. It was strange to see the man on his plane for once.

"John doesn't really like people," Sherlock replied fondly, lips curling in a gentle smile.

"People like him enough," Mike said sadly.

Sherlock chuckled and shrugged. "Doesn't really equate."

"So," Mike said, turning towards Sherlock, "how long have you been spying on John?"

Sherlock's smile turned into a frown until he saw that Mike was teasing him.

"Long enough to know you used to call me the school poltergeist," Sherlock replied flatly.

"That was you?" Mike asked, eyes wide.

"None other than," Sherlock replied.

"Why on EARTH did you tape a cadaver to the ceiling?" Mike asked.

Sherlock shrugged and looked away. "Bored."

Mike chuckled and turned back to watch John as a young woman in a green jumper sat down across from him. She was hoping he was up for something. Sherlock was hoping he wasn't. She won out.

Sherlock walked away as John and his 'new friend' left arm in arm and Mike struggled to keep up with him.

"How long have you been dead?" Mike asked.

"Long enough," Sherlock replied angrily.

_____

The girl was a good lay but, as ever, it wasn't enough. John was on his back listening to her sleep when he felt a cold breeze. He looked to the right, almost expecting to see a misty figure. There was nothing there. He was going bonkers. 

It had taken time but he'd given in and spent a bit more than he wanted to on a surveillance kit and rigged his room. What he'd found was confusing at best; all the video was skewed. There was a weird feedback when he replayed times he knew someone had been in the room. He'd come back to a plate of hot food and when he ran the video back it would simply appear after ten or so seconds of fuzz. 

He'd given up video shortly after and gone to audio. That was when things changed. He heard voices. Not in his head, he wasn't mad, but on tape. He heard one voice in particular. He wrongly attributed it to an angel. 

"John," it whispered. "John."

The first time it showed up on a recording John must have played it back twenty times. That small bit of tape held his name, he was sure of it.

Now, as he lay back in some random dorm room with his body covered in cooling sweat and his eyes closed, he thought he heard it again. He swallowed roughly and turned onto his side with a sigh.

"John," the soft noise said, "oh, John."

_____

Mike and Sherlock became good friends, mostly due to Mike's persistence. Sherlock was put in the position to teach Mike how to do things in this new world and, though he wasn't a particularly patient teacher, he managed to do a fairly good job.

That was possibly why Mike started bringing him what Sherlock referred to as 'strays'. People who died took a while to realise it. It was a sort of slow second blow to death, Sherlock thought, that you didn't know until it was much too late. Because of that little quirk of fate many a ghost was decimated before they were able to come to their full potential.

"This is my mate, Sherlock," Mike said as he walked to where he knew John, and therefore Sherlock, would be on John's twenty first birthday.

Sherlock slipped his hands into the pockets of his lake blue dressing gown and gave the new stray a strained smile.

The man looked around in a confused manner and then his eyes settled on Sherlock.

"Tell him what you told me, lad," Mike said, coaxing the man forward.

"I think," the man croaked, "that is, I reckon there's something wrong with me."

"Not anymore," Sherlock replied flatly.

The man looked between Sherlock and Mike. Sherlock sighed and started to explain. On the other side of the window, at his usual booth, John sat drinking his fourth birthday pint and playing with a paper napkin. 'Happy birthday,' he thought weakly, 'to me.'


	8. Took You Long Enough

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> STOP!!!! READ FIRST!!!!
> 
> For my more delicate readers, which is in no way an insult:  
> This chapter isn't happy. Our happy end isn't until just at the end of the next chapter and the beginning of the tenth. If you're having a bad day or are prone to anxiety you might want to wait a few days until I finish the story so the pain can be followed with warm fuzzies.
> 
> For the rest of you:  
> Prepare to bleed.

Sherlock continued to speak to John and did one better by showing up in his dreams again. It gave Sherlock the hope that he would someday be able to get John to see him again as well. He found it a bit strange that he was back in John's dreams as a child, but John was a child too so he didn't see it as an issue.

The first night it happened John had just moved into a new flatshare with a few school 'mates' and he was exhausted as he fell into bed after an all day shift at school and then a shift at work. His fingertips were aching from holding hot coffees and his back was aching from bending over in the child's wing all day. He sleepily pulled off his trousers and shirt and barely even got under the covers as sleep took him.

Sherlock had followed him back on the tube, standing next to him and talking to him like he used to with little 'you really should be listening's and 'you're foolish for not seeing me's peppering their way home. He watched as John fell to sleep and then lay next to him on the luxuriously large, if a bit uncomfortable, bed. He sighed and felt himself drifting into John's consciousness like he had when he'd followed John to bed years and years ago.

John was in a field. He lay on his back with the string of a kite in his hand, chewing a blade of grass. Sherlock hadn't remembered the smattering of freckles John used to get in the summer and the sight of them, so inconsequential, cause him to nearly lose his footing as nostalgia took over.

John lay silently like that for a long time, the sun too damn bright and his eyes squinted. Finally Sherlock took a few steps towards him. The grass was cool beneath his feet and he breathed air he was sure had never been that fresh. As he hesitated John looked up at him and a smile crinkled his nose.

"Took you long enough," John laughed, spitting the grass out before looking back up at his kite.

Sherlock felt a tightness in his throat and nodded solemnly before joining John in the grass. He crossed his legs and bit his lip before speaking.

"I've been trying to get here," he said, voice shaky.

"Not hard enough," John said, chuckling and passing Sherlock an apple.

A hot tear ran down Sherlock's cheek and he nodded quickly.

"S'alright," John sighed, "you're here now and that's all that counts. I missed you, you know."

Sherlock could not have returned the sentiment more strongly.

_____

The next morning when John woke up he hurried into the loo to get ready for school and only remembered the dream when he was under the hot spray of the shower. Sherlock was sat on the toilet, listening, when he heard John's knees buckle and hit the slick surface and soon after, wracking sobs. He swallowed and turned his face away, but refused to leave John's side. No matter how much it hurt.

_____

Sherlock started following John into his dreams every night, whether as participant or bystander. The night of his next birthday John brought home a girl from the pub and made love to her while Sherlock stood on the kerb outside. Sherlock waited until the lights went out and then trudged up the stairs, listening to make sure they were asleep, and then crept into the room. He gritted his teeth but lay on the floor next to John's side of the bed.

In the dream Sherlock made John promise to not let anyone take his place. John never brought another girl into his bed, his sexual liaisons being short and dirty in med room closets and cafe loos. It made Sherlock feel a bit better.

_____

John was quickly pushing to the top of his class. He was beyond competent in everything he did and was soon being used by professors to show the underclassmen how to do stitches up right and whether or not to pack wounds.

The A&E did him well, the quick pace keeping his mind from drifting too much to how his mother had told him he needed to start making friends and how his father told him he wasn't working hard enough. He didn't want friends and if he worked any harder, to be brutally honest, he figured his fingers would fall off.

Sherlock got more and more caught up in helping Mike with strays and assisting some of the persistent ones in finding their killers. Although it took him away from John during the day it was still rather fun deducing things and following leads. If only John could assist him.

_____

Before he knew it John was graduating at twenty three and a half, with honors of course, and readying himself for active duty. Sherlock had taken a resigned view of the whole 'shipping out' thing and simply told himself that it wasn't ever meant to be for always. John wasn't ever really his.

It didn't mean that when John left he felt nothing. He felt a whole lot of things, and none of them good.

The night prior he'd taken John on a walk, in their dreams, through the creek behind his house. They splashed in the water like good seven year olds and got covered in muck. They tied bits of beef liver to strings and fished for crawdads. They lay in the grass, sunlight peeking through the leaves far above to warm their skin. They held hands, small, soft hands. Sherlock made John promise he'd never leave him.


	9. Soon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys! Had a migraine yesterday and couldn't write. Thanks for hanging in there. One more chapter after this one.

It was hot in Afghanistan. That wasn't exactly a revelation, John knew, but it was worth noting. He was in his bunk with a spare biro and pad of paper trying to write something, anything, to his family. He wrote that it was hot and nothing more. He didn't want to write to them, he wanted to write to Sherlock.

It had come as a disappointment when the dreams of Sherlock disappeared. He'd been in Afghanistan for three weeks then and they'd been gone since the first day. It was like one more small piece of home had been wrenched away. It left him feeling hollow.

"Oi, Watson," a kid named Murray squawked from the doorway.

John looked up and sighed, noting the blood on he kid's hands with unease. They had said it would be hard. John tossed the pen and notebook aside and went to scrub up.

_____

Sherlock was sat on the edge of the roof, legs hanging and swaying, when Mike approached. He heard the heavy footfalls and closed his eyes.

"Not really the time, Mike," he said, voice flat yet unable to hide his pain.

"They've got an albino on the slab," Mike said, getting close enough to touch Sherlock but looking in the other direction.

Sherlock's head perked up and Mike smiled a bit. 

"Adult?" Sherlock asked quickly.

"Yes. Male. Nothing outside he ordinary besides the lack of colour. Frighteningly pale due to blood loss as well. Cause of death, I'm afraid," Mike agreed.

Sherlock stood carefully and joined Mike in the short walk back to the stairs.

"Was he a local?" Sherlock asked.

Mike looked confused and Sherlock brushed it off. He supposed it was a bit rich to assume his brother had had some hand in it.

He had, of course. Mycroft had managed to redirect the ambulance when it became apparent that the man had no chance. The vehicle didn't even have its lights on, for god's sake. He was wired into so much of the government at that point he might as well BE the government. A few key words entered and the medical information on five different interesting cases had blinked on the screen in front of him.

Sherlock and Mike made their way to the morgue on the large Emergancy elevator, talking the whole way. Neither had seen an albino and the chance, even after death, to gain knowledge on something they'd only read about wasn't one either would pass up. When they made it to the morgue floor a young ghost ran into the room and sidled up to Sherlock.

"News on Watson, sir," the boy whispered.

Sherlock nodded and the boy went on to tell him that John had undergone his first surgery with resounding success and was having trouble writing to his family.

"Did he get the tea I shipped his way?" Sherlock asked, Mycroft not being the only Holmes that had mastered online manipulation.

"Yes, sir," the boy replied cheerily. "They couldn't make out where it had come from!"

"Good, good," Sherlock mumbled. "Is that all?"

"Yes, sir," the boy replied.

"You're excused," Sherlock said with a fond smile, watching as the boy ran off.

"Dead body now?" Mike asked.

Sherlock nodded and they went to stand close as a few students got to work on the albino.

_____

The fourth and fifth surgeries went just as easily, not to mention the stitches and other smaller bits in between, and John soon became known as the most competent Doctor any of them had ever had. Watson, it was said, could fix anything.

Four months in John met someone who reminded him, almost uncomfortably, of an old friend. His new commanding officer was tall and thin and gruff in a manner that was so close to Sherlock that it took John a bit to get over it. He was quieter than Sherlock ever had been, though, and not half as pushy. 

Sholto was struck in the arm by a ricocheted bullet a month after they met and John walked in on him cleaning out the wound at John's station that night after everything had been put away. So put off by the man's willingness to go against protocol was he that John forgot his place and spoke as one would to a naughty child.

"I suppose you think it's a good idea to use other people's things without asking," he said as he approached, not minding the sound of pain that came with the surprise of being found out.

Sholto grew still before turning and looking at John like he was trying to understand him. John covered the small shiver he felt at once again being flayed by ice blue eyes and took a step forward.

"Sit. Before you do anymore damage," he murmured, going to scrub up without a look back.

He felt a sort of warmth when he came back to find Sholto sitting, eyes on the ground and arm on the table, where he had been told to.

"You're lacking quite a bit of common sense," John said as he prodded at the bullet hole and started another bit of bleeding.

"You're lacking quite a bit of bedside manner," Sholto replied, eyes on John's now.

"If you wanted bedside manner you shouldn't have joined the army," John said, unable to stop the small smile that was working its way onto his face.

"Are you going to keep scolding me or are you going to do your job?" Sholto asked.

John grabbed the flush and started in on his work. "Already doing my job, and you like the scolding," he said under his breath.

Sholto didn't reply, just sat still and worked his jaw and let John clean. 

By the time John had put in half a dozen stitches and was covering it with a bandage he'd grown used to Sholto's eyes on him. Barely even noticed the way they lingered on his neck. When he drew away and went to wash his hands he assumed the man would leave. He didn't.

"Need something else, sir?" John asked when he sensed Sholto was still in the room.

"No," Sholto said, eyes still on John.

John let the older man help him clean up, giving instructions as they went, and then said yes to a game of late night poker in his barracks. He thought he might end up sucking him off but that didn't happen. 

_____

The first time Sholto had his arms around John was almost a year later. They'd been through a bad bout of fighting in the previous week and both were desperate for something to get their minds off the war. It was dangerous, stupidly so, but they weren't really thinking.

"I need you," John whispered against Sholto's ear.

Sholto pulled him into his lap and held him tightly without a word. John breathed out a sob and rocked his hips and Sholto sighed into his neck as he grabbed his arse. They rocked there for a fevered couple of minutes before coming in their pants and separating. John licked his lips and nodded thanks to Sholto as the older man left his tent.

That night John dreamed of Sherlock again. He was back in sixth form and buggering Sherlock against his football locker. 

'I need you,' he growled.

'Please,' Sherlock keened.

_____

John couldn't touch Sholto again after the dream. He thought he'd have to explain himself, or at least clumsily rebuke an offer. It never came to that. There wasn't time.

_____

One of Sherlock's ghost network came running up to him in a panic one day as he was out walking the grounds. The girl looked nervous to tell him so he saved her the trouble.

"I know," he said.

Her eyes grew wide and she nodded and turned to leave, then hesitated. "Do we all get to meet him, sir?" She asked gently.

Sherlock swallowed roughly and nodded. "I suppose you will."

The girl bit her lip and then skipped away. Sherlock felt his knees start to give way and sat at the base of an oak. 

John. 

Soon.

_____

John could see that people were standing over him, it just seemed as if they were doing so from a frightening height. He tried to speak and couldn't. He tried to move.

They'd strapped him into the helicopter headed to the closest hospital but they all knew what had happened wasn't something you survived. Watson could fix anything, anything but himself.

The sound of the helicopter blades and the sedative lulled John to sleep. He was on his way. On his way home.


	10. The Whole Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, here it is, the big reveal. I've decided to write two more chapters. The next one will be what Sherlock did while john was away in Afghanistan. Then we'll see resolved joh lock domesticity at its best.

It was a medically induced coma. He wouldn't last long otherwise.

If he'd been awake he'd have been angry that he was back in London. He needed to be with his men. His men needed him. He needed the adrenalin.

Sherlock had expected John to come back in a bag. He'd felt the blast from the IED when it happened and it was enough to send him to the ground. He felt it when John screamed out in pain. It was like nothing else he'd ever felt. Well, one other thing, he supposed. Burning alive hadn't been a treat.

Sherlock brushed his hand over John's and felt the warmth there, a warmth that he knew wouldn't last long. Harry was in the corner, smell of hard liquor on her breath, grinding her teeth. Mrs Watson was in a chair next to John's bed crying as the vicar gave last rights. John had a cross round his neck and it slipped to the side, nestled against his ID discs.

A nurse came in and went about unhooking all the bits and bobs that were keeping him alive. Sherlock left the room, he couldn't watch this, couldn't see the love of his life (death) withering away. Couldn't listen to the heart rate monitor slow and announce his death.

_____

John couldn't figure out why he was back at Bart's. He was in his fatigues so he figured he must be on leave, only...

The weather was cold but it didn't seem to be a bother. He'd missed London, missed the fog and drizzle.

He walked through the park outside Bart's, cane in hand (and that was new and equally confusing). He was about to go for a coffee when someone called his name. He tried to ignore it.

"John Watson," the man shouted.

It was Mike. Mike Stamford, who had decided to stop returning his calls and not come to his birthday and John was most definitely not in the mood to talk to the bastard.

"It's me," Mike said, "Mike Stamford. We went to Bart's together."

John swallowed and nodded, unable to walk around the man. "Right, yes, Mike."

Mike smiled one of his classically over the top smiles. "I know, I got fat."

John tried to smile and it came off a little strange. "I've, uh, I've got to get on my way," he said nervously.

"Where to, then?" Mike asked, and that gave John pause.

"Well..." John tried.

"You look a bit confused, mate," Mike said, smile a bit pitying then, and wasn't that insulting. "I've got someone you should meet."

John was going to say no but Mike was already walking away in the direction of the hospital so, after looking over his shoulder, John followed. Mike held the door for him so as not to frighten. When ghosts were this new they had mental breaks if they saw someone walk through a wall. John walked into the building and followed Mike down the hall to a lab John knew well. 

Not so well, it turned out. The new equipment was impressive. And only a few years later.

"Bit different in my day," John mumbled as he looked around.

"John, this is my friend Sherlock," Mike said, arm pointing to the taller man, bent over a microscope.

John's head shot up at the same time that Sherlock's did and his eyes were as big as saucers. It couldn't be, it just couldn't. Only...it was.

"John," Sherlock said, voice much lower than John had remembered.

It wasn't the only thing that was different. He was gorgeous. All the awkwardness of adolescence gone and Sherlock was stunning. It took John's breath away. For a moment at least.

He sniffed angrily and turned to leave.

"You really don't want to do that," Sherlock said mildly.

John spun and growled. "Oh, yeah? And why the bleeding hell not?"

"Think John, really think," Sherlock said, taking a step forward. "How did you end up here?"

"Well, I..." John tried, trailing off.

"And the cane? You might as well be carrying it over your shoulder for all the good it's doing you," Sherlock added, the statement harsh but the delivery not.

John looked at the cane and picked it up, for the life of him unable to remember where it came from. Sherlock waited for him to look up and then took a few steps more in his direction. He smiled softly.

"I'm afraid you didn't make it out of Afghanistan in very good shape," Sherlock said in a soothing manner that contradicted the words. "How much do you remember of the explosion?"

John's eyebrows knit and he thought. Explosion. Jesus, there had been an explosion. How on earth- "roadside bomb," he said shakily. "Under a bit of rocks. Didn't see it. Murray drove right over it as we were making our way south. It was...Christ, it was hot."

Sherlock nodded and licked his lips. "And then?"

"Black," John choked, "just black."

"And when you saw Mike?" Sherlock asked.

"I can't-" John said, looking a little peaky.

"I think you can," Sherlock replied. "What do you think has happened, John?"

"I can't be...I can't be dead," John said, reaching for the cross around his neck.

"Why not?" Sherlock pressed.

"Cause this sure isn't heaven," John squeaked.

"Afraid not," Sherlock said, sympathy and fondness expanding his chest.

"Hell?" John asked nervously.

"Not that either," Sherlock chuckled. "Just Bart's."

"So...what am I?" John asked, head spinning.

"Same as me. You're a ghost," Sherlock said smoothly.

"Bollocks!" John sputtered, taking a step backwards.

"Want proof?" Sherlock asked.

John stilled and then nodded. Sherlock picked up a biro and tossed it at John. John's hand reached for it and it flew right through him, hitting the ground and bouncing away. John looked up at Sherlock in shock and the man shrugged.

"Then...then how did you pick it up? If you're like me?" John asked.

"Been at it longer than you," Sherlock replied.

John's eyes grew wide and he took in the blue pajamas and Sherlock's lack of shoes. 

"H-how much longer?" He whispered roughly.

"The whole time," Sherlock said softly, "the whole time."

John shook his head in disbelief and tried to think of all the reasons it couldn't be true.

"But you aged, you got older!" He shouted.

"We all do," Sherlock said.

"You had a flat! Ghosts don't have bloody flats!" John shouted.

"Why not?" Sherlock asked, more than a little amused.

"Well, for one thing, you can't pay rent," John tried, eyebrows knit.

"My brother managed to do everything digitally. He's actually quite good at it. Took a bit of practice but he infiltrated the web successfully. There's a lot you can do when you're determined," Sherlock said.

"So that's why you never came to my house?" John asked, starting to put things together. "And why you gave me a fake phone number?"

"Yes," Sherlock admitted.

John sobbed and covered his eyes. "I missed you," he said.

"I missed you too," Sherlock replied, finally closing the distance and placing his hand on John's shoulder.

John jolted and looked up. "You!" He exclaimed, suddenly sure. "It was you all along! You bloody haunted me!"

"Guilty," Sherlock said, running his fingers into John's hair.

John laughed hysterically and crumbled into Sherlock's arms. Sherlock held him tightly and kissed the top of his head.

"You bastard," John chuckled, now a lot less upset about being dead. "You utter bastard."

Sherlock laughed and shrugged. "You used to think I was Jesus," he teased.

John laughed harder and breathed deeply. "I hate you," he said, smile wide.

"No you don't," Sherlock whispered into his hair.

"No," John agreed, "I really don't."


	11. Mrs H

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys. Here is a little background chapter on how Sherlock and Mrs Hudson met. One chapter after this and it's off to another adventure. I've thoroughly enjoyed ha I you all along and if you had an idea for the next story leave it in a comment.

John had only been gone a week yet the whole of Bart's felt painfully empty. Every bit of Sherlock's schedule had been thrown aside, every second of the day uncertain. He had known that he spent a lot of time around John but it hadn't occurred to him that his whole day was based on John's movements. Sure, at lunch Sherlock would head off to do one ghost thing or another but after that he'd check in on John, make sure he was fed and rested. Now he had no one to check in on and his life felt hollow.

That was how he found himself on the street in the middle of the night just in time to be pushed aside by a very drunk man. That happened sometimes, drunks being able to not only see but touch ghosts. Inebriation caused a sort of weakening of the temporal membrane that separated the living from the dead. The man was completely pissed.

Sherlock stood watching as he fumbled with his keys and an older woman opened the door for him. What he saw next made his guts roil.

"Get out of my way, woman," the man bellowed.

The woman tried to move to the side just as the man did and they bumped together in the small entryway. That was when he hit her. It was a loud connection and she slid to the floor with her hands clutching her face. She started to sob and he kicked her once before stumbling up the stairs.

"Every time," he shouted, "every bloody time you have to be in the way!"

Without thinking Sherlock followed him up the stairs.

"I'm sorry," the woman cried.

"Bitch," the man hissed.

That was when he fell. Well, fell is a rather strong word, isn't it? That was when he started his descent. Sherlock made that descent possible by pushing the man from the top of the stairs. When he came to a still at the bottom he had multiple broken bones and a broken neck. The woman shrieked and looked him over before calling the police.

_____

Mrs Hudson, as Sherlock had learned was her name, sat on the edge of the ambulance while a tech looked after her split lip. A detective was trying to console her but it really wasn't needed. To Sherlock's delight she had taken this all fairly well. She was strong.

"My sister will come up from Hull to help me with the arrangements," she said calmly.

"It will take a few days for the case to be closed but as far as I'm concerned this was an obvious drunken fall. You were lucky that the door was wide open and your neighbor was awake across the street or we might have thought you pushed him," an assistant to the detective said.

Mrs Hudson's eyes grew wide. "Pushed him? Oh, lord no, the man may have been a right bastard but I'd never kill him," she dismissed.

The detective gave his assistant a look that said very clearly that she wasn't wanted and the woman turned and left with a huff.

"I'm sorry about that Mrs. Hudson," the detective said with an exasperated smile.

"Not a worry, hon, let me get you all some scones. I have fresh ones on the table in my flat and you've all worked so hard," Mrs Hudson tittered before getting up and walking back into the building. 

A few people tried to stop her but, as Sherlock looked on, she remained determined. A few minutes later she came out with a tray covered in scones and bread and cheeses. After a couple of minutes of argument the detective called a break and everyone sat around eating and talking softly.

Sherlock watched, fond smile playing across his lips. He liked this woman. He liked her a great deal.

_____

It was less than a week later, around three a.m., that Sherlock found himself walking through Regent's park. He was doing that more and more, the walking. He realised that he'd done a great deal of walking and thinking before but it was always in the manner of following John from place to place. Now that John wasn't around his walking branched out and he covered quite a bit of ground.

He saw a small blue flower pushing through the brush and it reminded him of the woman he'd met. Determined and strong. Alive among thorns and detritus. It was her all round. He picked it.

_____

Mrs Hudson knew her husband hadn't fallen, what with the way his eyes widened and he readily flew forward. The only problem was that there hadn't been anyone there. 

She'd grown up in a family of recent immigrants from Iceland, her and her sister being orphaned at three, so her first thought was faeries. This wasn't like the faeries she'd heard of, though. Those faeries were more likely to push her down a flight of stairs than to help her get rid of her brute of a husband. Still...there were other things in the world that refused to be seen by human eyes.

_____

By the time Sherlock had made it through Regent's and was walking steadily towards Mrs Hudson's building he had an armful of flowers. His mother might have scolded him for taking away the beauty from the park but in his mind if wasn't an issue, as he'd only picked the broken stemmed ones and those which couldn't be seen from the path. It had been park maintenance if anything, he told himself.

The lights were off in Mrs H's flat and Sherlock went in through the back door and found his way to her. She was sleeping fitfully, the only thing keeping her unconscious being the lozenges on the bedside table. The handwritten label said 'herbal soothers' and they smelled strongly of cannabis. Sherlock smiled to himself and went into the loo right off the bedroom, placing the flowers in the sink and wondering why he'd been so affected by this woman.

He went and lay back on the sofa for a few minutes to continue his thoughts on his latest case. The minutes turned to hours and around seven he was roused from his thinking by a high pitched squeal. He ran in to find Mrs Hudson holding one of the flowers and smiling with tears in her eyes.

"I know this isn't my dead husband," she said aloud, "as he was never sorry for any slight."

Sherlock stood stock still as she waited, possibly for some sort of sign, and then went on.

"If it's you, and I suppose it is, I know you pushed him," she added.

Sherlock felt himself take a step back, eyes wide.

"And...well, thank you for that. He was a horrid little man even when he wasn't going round killing people. Suppose he should have kicked it a bit before just last week but I never had the wherewithal for murder."

Sherlock turned and left, thinking how odd it was for a person to just believe something unthinkable could transpire.

_____

There was a horrible storm the next week and several blocks of houses were left without power. Sherlock stopped by Mrs Hudson's to make sure she was doing okay and was drawn inside by the firelight and smell of thick cut bacon. He entered, through the back again, and found Mrs Hudson cooking in her fireplace. 

The whole house was filled with candles and rich smells and Sherlock moved closer to look over Mrs H's shoulder and into the pot she was stirring. She had some sort of baked beans with bacon around the edges and he was suddenly hungry for the first time that he could really remember. He reached out without thinking and brushed through her shoulder.

She turned abruptly and looked about. "Well, hello again. Don't suppose I should expect you to use the doorbell but a little notice would help. Maybe I should set up a bell."

Sherlock smiled and settled into the sofa to watch her cook and natter on about this thing or that. When she finally went to sleep she left one candle lit and bid him goodnight.

_____

The woman next door to Mrs Hudson was horrid. She was always going on about how she'd won some bake-off and how Mrs Hudson should really use a specific type of butter and how her grandson was in medical school and 'wasn't it nice to have children, oh, you wouldn't know'. Sherlock wanted to slap the woman. Instead he stole her butter, yes the butter she was so keen on bragging about, and stuck it in Mrs Hudson's refrigerator. 

"You little thief!" Mrs Hudson chirped.

Sherlock smiled and took a seat in the kitchen.

"You really should return this..." she started, "only I was about to run out and I was hoping to make my signature lemon bars. Well, just this time, you hear? I don't mind having spirits around but naughty spirits don't get dessert."

Sherlock thought for a long time about how that had been a weak threat, as he couldn't have dessert either way, and watched his newly adopted human cook.

She was actually a very good chef and when he saw the look on the face of the neighbor, Mrs Turner, as she took a bite of lemon bar he was more than a little proud. Mrs Turner pretended the bars were only okay and Sherlock promised Mrs H he'd take to slamming doors behind her.

_____

Sherlock came back to the wing at Bart's that he called home one day to find that they'd started the renovations. His things, all is things were in risk of being discovered. He packed everything he could into some garbage bags and used his newly discovered ability to move corporeal objects without notice to get them back to Mrs Hudson's. 

He had them arranged in the upstairs flat by midday and was resting back on an old leather sofa when Mrs H came in. He was more than surprised. She hadn't been upstairs in the whole time Sherlock had been hanging around, as was attested to by the cobwebs in the doorway, literal cobwebs.

"Well, this is a mess," she said, hands going to her hips.

Sherlock stood and backed away.

"If you want the flat you'll have to be a bit more helpful around here," she said calmly. "And no more stealing from Mrs Turner...unless I'm completely out of milk. Which I am."

Sherlock shot down the stairs and through the wall so quickly the tablecloth in Mrs Turner's flat fluttered. He made a lightbulb pop and took the milk right through the refrigerator door. He put the new milk in its right place and rushed back up the stairs to find Mrs Hudson dusting. He sighed loudly and flopped onto the sofa.

"Don't pout," she said, somehow sensing his emotions, "you should be glad I don't make you do the cleaning and washing up."

Sherlock crossed his arms and rolled his eyes and Mrs Hudson laughed.

"Touchy, you are," she said fondly, and then, "I never had children, you know."

Sherlock was quite moved by the strange comment and found himself putting old newspapers into a bin the woman had brought up and smiling as she told him about her childhood.

_____

After that day he fully moved in. Mrs H would leave little 'honey do' lists out and Sherlock would finish half of them before giving up and going back to solving murders. Six months later Sherlock found himself helping prepare early Christmas dinner for several of the people who had helped Mrs Hudson the night her husband had his fall. 

He wasn't happy about it in the least. He found that he preferred it when it was just him and Mrs H. He didn't like the idea of the flat being full of strangers.

"Flour," the woman said, hand outstretched.

Sherlock placed the measuring cup in her hand and sulked from where he was sat on the counter.

"Maybe you can make a friend tonight," she said.

When he snorted she went on.

"We've got all kinds round here. I wouldn't believe it if you were our only ghost. Plus, that detective seemed unhappy and I know how much you helped my sour mood after you-know-who died. Not that I'm saying you should bring him flowers," she added. "Unless you think he'd like that sort of thing."

Sherlock really hoped no one would bring a ghost with them to the party and, as strange as the concept seemed, grew a bit worried. 

_____

When it was finally time for people to show up his worry grew wings, or feet. Sure enough, someone had brought a ghost. It was the detective, detective Lestrade, although Sherlock was convinced he didn't know he'd brought any such thing. The ghost was very newly dead and quite a bit more shouty than Sherlock had encountered in a while.

"You're taking a night off from my MURDER?" It demanded, arms waving. "That's rich!"

"Why do you think you were murdered?" Sherlock asked.

The ghost turned, obviously not been acknowledged yet, and gaped.

"Well, tell me what happened," Sherlock prodded.

"I had enemies," the ghost said shakily.

"I'm not surprised," Sherlock replied.

"What do you mean by that?" The ghost shouted, neck bulging.

"You're shouty and show signs of a nervous disorder and you've spent...three days harassing someone who can't see or hear you," Sherlock said calmly. "That's enough to be going on, don't you think?"

As the ghost continued to shout at him Sherlock circled him four times and then came out with his discovery.

"You had a heart attack. Maybe if you went home instead of spending all your time yelling at detective Lestrade you'd hear that from your family. I'm sure they're making arrangements for your wake as well. Everyone will be talking cause of death then," he said quickly.

The ghost looked confused, cursed, and then left. When detective Lestrade relaxed a bit more Mrs Hudson looked to the door and winked. It wasn't at him, as he was standing next to the hearth, but Sherlock understood none the less. 

_____

And that's how Martha Hudson went and got herself a ghost tenant. Well, how she got her first ghost tenant. Sherlock, of course, brought the second one home. Bringing home dead things like a cat.


	12. Sherlock Holmes, Ghost Detective

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here's our final chapter. I'm so glad to have you all with me. I'll see you at the next one.

Being a ghost really wasn't that bad. Sure, he felt awful for what that meant to his mother and sister but it wasn't as if John could have stopped it. Sometimes things just happened and there was nothing to do for it but to move on. 

Sherlock was teaching him all the ins and outs and he was picking up on things pretty well. Three weeks in and he was changing light bulbs for Mrs Hudson and helping Sherlock with cases. He especially enjoyed the cases. 

He got his first taste of real time spookery a month or so in and the adrenalin of combat paled in comparison. It was a case involving a horrible boss who had harassed his employee to such a state that him simply showing up on her doorstep ended in suicide.

Sherlock dealt in murders and, as anyone would attest to, this was just about the same. His actions led to her death. Murder. The most cowardly murder you could manage, at that.

The ghost, a small thing with nervous eyes and understandable paranoia, was watching reruns of Top Gear at Sherlock and John's while the two of them went out to meet up with another ghost and do what they did best. John was just learning to materialize and the man had been Army so Sherlock put him to work. The three of them went to the bastard's flat and upturned all his things, leaving a trail of photos from his time active across the floor, turned off the lights and lay in wait.

"Do you remember your lines?" Sherlock asked, voice in a hoarse whisper for no bloody reason whatsoever.

"Of course I remember my lines," John replied in a similar whisper. "Not exactly Shakespeare."

Sherlock rolled his eyes and John licked his lips; he loved getting his little jabs in. 

"Doesn't have to be Shakespeare to get the job done," Sherlock said flatly.

"Do you ever do Dickens?" John asked with a mischievous smirk.

"Ghost of Christmas past? Really, John?" Sherlock hissed.

John laughed and they heard a key slip into the lock. They stood and waited as the man entered and flicked on the lights. Three bulbs crackled and went out and the man jumped. He hesitantly switched on another light and his eyes grew wide. He reached for the first picture, one of him and an old comrade in their dress clothes outside an army ball. Sherlock shoved it with his toe and the picture skittered away.

The man, Kennedy or Kevin or something, walked after it and made his way around the corner to see the utter destruction that had befallen his neat flat. Everything that had once been in a drawer or cabinet was now on the floor. Every glass object broken and every liquid leaking.

Sherlock moved up behind him and ran a hand across his shoulders, stepping back as the man turned and tried to swing, only to stumble and nearly fall.

"Who's there?" The man shouted.

"Just lay back and close your eyes," Sherlock whispered in a strange voice, mimicking something the man had once said to a younger officer.

The man spun again and John walked to the middle of the room and materialized to the best of his abilities. To be honest, it wasn't very good, but that was the point. John was just about good enough at it to appear but not without going translucent every few seconds in a flickering sort of way. The man's eyes grew wide and he took a step back from John.

"You said you'd protect us," John said pleadingly. "You said you'd protect us all."

Sherlock walked up behind him and gripped his neck with full force before going to shake the blinds on the far window.

"What's going on?" The man shouted, rubbing his neck.

John and Sherlock's accomplice, a dead junkie who had taken a shine to them, came from the bedroom with his arms outstretched and what looked like real blood flowing from his wrists. Sherlock and John could see the boy perfectly but their victim only saw the woman he'd pushed to suicide. He screeched and ran into the street.

"Not bad," Sherlock said.

John laughed and straightened his shoulders. "I agree," he murmured.

"Same time tomorrow night?" Their accomplice asked.

"Same time," Sherlock agreed. "And, thank you, Billy."

"Not a problem, sir. See you tomorrow, John," the accomplice replied happily.

When he'd gone John and Sherlock broke into giggles and slowly made their way out of the flat. When the laughter finally died down John spoke.

"I didn't think he'd take off like that," he said. "I only used a third of my lines."

"Everyone's different. Plus, you can use the rest tomorrow. It always has more impact the second time around," Sherlock said with a happy sigh.

"You're a very bad man," John teased, reaching out and taking Sherlock's hand in his as they made their way home.

"Mmm. But only for the right reasons," Sherlock replied, squeezing John's hand.

"You're quite handsome when you're wicked," John added.

"And you're horny when you're impressed," Sherlock said bluntly, cheeks red with excitement.

"You gonna suck me off with that dirty mouth, Mr Holmes?" John teased, pushing Sherlock back against the wall of a closed bank and pressing a leg between his.

"Someone could see," Sherlock said breathily.

"Let them watch," John replied.

Sherlock shuddered and John laughed and dragged him back into the street and towards home. It wasn't likely that a ghost would see but if they did, and it was a child, John wouldn't be able to live (die?) with himself.

They made it up to their flat to find the girl they were working for nodding off on the sofa. It wasn't unlike a new ghost to be pushed into a trance or sleep-like state. Dying was exhausting business. They turned the telly off and snuck past her and into their bedroom.

"What if she wakes up?" Sherlock asked, leaning back against the door and letting himself be disrobed.

"She won't," John said.

"But what if she does?" Sherlock asked.

"I'll stay in my clothes," John replied, leaning in to kiss across Sherlock's back.

Sherlock seemed to find this acceptable and closed his eyes, biting his lip so as not to moan. John wrestled his cock out of his pants and stroked him quickly.

"John," Sherlock whispered.

"Yeah, gorgeous," John whispered back, rutting against Sherlock's arse.

"Please," Sherlock whined, close to coming already from the adrenalin alone.

"Do it," John whispered into his ear, rocking onto his toes and chasing his own orgasm.

Sherlock keened and came and John pushed against him a few more times before doing so himself.

Sherlock started to chuckle and John giggled along and they were soon a pile of limbs on the floor. John laughed harder and Sherlock looked over at him.

"What's so funny?" He asked, smiling and kissing John's fingers.

"Wanna know what's better than life after death?" John asked.

Sherlock raised an eyebrow and a fresh peal of laughter broke from John. 

"The sex," he sputtered.

Sherlock tried to look scandalized and failed and John pulled him into his arms. Sherlock curled into his chest and closed his eyes, content to listen to John's breathing.

"You're really back," he whispered several minutes later.

"Mmm," John agreed. "I am."

"I missed you," Sherlock said for only the second time.

John swallowed roughly, feeling the emotion in the room change, and ran his fingers through Sherlock's hair. "I missed you too."

"But you're back for good," Sherlock said, soothing himself.

"Forever," John said softly. "I'm yours forever."

Sherlock nodded and drifted off.

_____

Business boomed. Word got out that if you had good reason there were a couple of lads who'd haunt the hell out of someone for you. Between that and helping that detective, Lestrade, solve murders fairly regularly our boys had plenty on their plates and were happy to be so busy.

Sherlock started to refer to himself as the one and only ghost detective and John took up writing about it for leisure. They were the perfect team for years and years.

When the time came for them to go, because ghosts don't really last forever but dying isn't exactly the word for it, they did so by each other's sides. That made it a lot easier for fate to put them into the next world side by side. They were matching souls, after all, like nesting dolls.

So it began again, the story of two boys growing up together and finding that they never wanted to be anywhere other than by each other's sides.


End file.
